back to church
Heavenly Gospel Singers, “Jesus Traveled On This Road Before”
Live, St. James Missionary Baptist Church, Canton, Miss., 1978
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lagniappe
reading table: more of Seamus Heaney
Reading (New York), 2011
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Funeral (Dublin), September 2, 2013
old school
Charlie Musselwhite (1944-; vocals, harmonica) with Big Walter Horton (1918-1981; vocals, harmonica), live, Chicago, 1981
Charlie’s playing is wonderful: it both swings and sings. And he’s got great presence. But listen to Walter, whom I had the chance to work with in the ’70s when I was with Alligator Records. He’s not onstage long; this was only months before his death. But there are moments, when Walter’s playing, where time seems to stop (16:11, 18:03, 18:22, 19:57, etc.).
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lagniappe
reading table
You can fall a long way in sunlight.
You can fall a long way in the rain.The ones who don’t take the old white horse
take the morning train.—Robert Hass (1941-), “August Notebook: A Death” (excerpt)
what’s new
Have you heard the new Julia Holter? This is honestly, seriously good. It may be the best album I’ve heard this year.
—my son Alex (now twenty-five), before playing me this track
Julia Holter, “World,” 2013
alone
This is something I would never tire of hearing, not even if I were to live a thousand years.
Johann Sebastian Bach, Violin Sonata No. 1 in G minor, 2nd movement (fugue)
Henryk Szeryng (1918-1988), violin
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
Music offers a respite from the mind’s incessant chatter.
sounds of Chicago
Edward Wilkerson, tenor saxophone (with Kidd Jordan, tenor saxophone; Henry Grimes, bass, violin; Isaiah Spencer, drums, et al.), live, Chicago, 2010
alone
Paal Nilssen-Love (drums), live, Norway (Kongsberg Jazzfestival), 2011
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lagniappe
reading table
Faces are motion, which is why all the photos of you are bad. Even the most natural-looking portrait is a sentence interrupted, one note of an aria, held. Though faces themselves hide a deeper motion. You seem to sit there and meet my eyes across the table, but you are so many other places, clinging here for a moment against all the currents that will soon sweep you onward. We are so moved by the faces caught in the windows of trains going the other way because they tell us how all faces really are.
—James Richardson, “Ten-Second Essay #134”
Why not start the week with a slap in the face?
Savages, “City’s Full,” “Shut Up,” “She Will,” “Husbands,” live (studio performance), Seattle, 2013
two takes
“Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen”
Bessie Griffin (with Charles Barnett, piano), live, Switzerland (Montreux Jazz Festival), 1981
*****
Albert Ayler (AA, saxophone; Call Cobbs, piano; Henry Grimes, bass; Sunny Murray, drums), recording, 1964
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lagniappe
reading table
To live is to lose ground.
—E. M. Cioran (1911-1995; translated from French by Richard Howard)
My son Luke, now twenty-two and living in Kansas City, checks in:
Just got done with an assessment and had some time to listen to some music. Really digging this song lately—thought you might.
Wale (featuring Sam Drew), “LoveHate Thing,” 2013
Today, our fourth birthday, we revisit our first post.
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One left Cuba after the revolution, the other stayed. Here they play together: pianists—father and son—Bebo and Chucho Valdes.
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taking a break
I’m taking some time off—back soon.
music clip of the day 